


Northern lights

by AmyEsquire



Category: Tom Hiddleston - Fandom
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2012-11-25
Updated: 2012-11-25
Packaged: 2017-11-19 13:08:23
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,622
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/573626
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AmyEsquire/pseuds/AmyEsquire
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Elva Vernesen attends Gonville College at Cambridge to study History, leaving her old life overseas in Denmark. She meets the perfect stranger. But how does her life with him carry on? And is it everything she expected it to be?</p>
            </blockquote>





	Northern lights

**Author's Note:**

> I am not the author of this story! I've uploaded it on behalf of, and with the permission of, my good friend Kate, while she waits to receive her invitation to AO3 :) I hope you enjoy it!! :D

May 2001

Elva Vernersen stood leaning against the high wall, a glass of lemonade in one hand whilst the other tried to detangle her dark, messy hair. The music from the radio could be heard from where it played the Now! series of music. 

Babylon by David Grey

Elva still didn't understand why she was here. She knew one person. And that was the host. So he was off answering the door and offering nibbles and serving drinks like any good host would do. She hadn't seen him since he'd given her a rather rubbish hug on letting her in the front door and then pointed her towards the kitchen. 

But the fearless Dane didn't care. And she quite liked the garden ; it wasn't raining and it was warm enough to warrant her standing out here in a polo-shirt and denim shorts watching the evening sun spread across the sky.

She only recognised people from the odd glance in the coffee shops around Cambridge; nobody in her house had said they were going, one of her housemates had even asked who the host was. 

Suddenly, somebody caught her eye as they approached her. It was one girl who she did recognised; wearing a little summer dress with wavy blonde hair and a glass of coke with a slice of lemon in her hand. 

"Hi," she called loudly, as if Elva didn't understand what she was saying "Hi..you're Alva, aren't you? From Gonville?"

"It's Elva," Elva corrected her firmly, smiling falsely "And yes, it is. You're...," she searched through her mind's memory, trying to fix a name to the distinctly English, slightly freckled face and then said "You're Jessica, aren't you?"

"Yes," Elva breathed a silent sigh of relief as the girl nodded "I'm at Pembroke, studying Classics?"

"Oh," Elva smiled as Jess beckoned her across the patio to where she and a couple of other girls were talking to two guys.

"Michelle, Kate," she addressed the girls "Harvey, Robbie," she patted Elva on the back "This is Alva. She's studying History at Gonville."

"It's Elva," Elva corrected Jess again before having her hand firmly shook by one of the guys; he was tall and well-built with messy brown hair.

"You're Swedish, aren't you?" He asked, briefly introducing himself as Robbie "I think I remember you from the debating club."

"No," Elva smiled and flicked her hair back behind her shoulders "No, I'm Danish. Not Swedish."

"They're all the same, aren't they?" Robbie asked. 

Elva didn't know if he was being deliberately stupid or had been born ignorant of world geography. She opened her mouth to speak again before a long hand appeared in between the shoulders of Robbie and Harvey. 

Another guy, about the same height as this Robbie and very slender, with a mass of blonde curls, appeared with a wide grin "Hey, guys," he held a glass of Scotch in his hands and continued "Sorry, Mum wouldn't get off the phone."

He looked up at Elva and smiled "I don't believe we've met," he held out his hand "My name's Tom."

Elva smiled back politely and took his hand "Elva. Pleased to meet you."

"I...," this Tom guy faltered and prodded himself in the chest "I'm at Pembroke, studying Classics with Jess."

"Gonville," Elva muttered "History."

Tom let go of her hand and asked "So are you on your own?"

"Yeah," Elva smiled and took a sip from her glass of lemonade "Everybody else decided they'd rather see Shrek. I thought I'd show my face." Her comment made the guys smile, particularly the blonde one. Awkward silence ensued once again and the group then began chatting about this and that; home, parents, siblings, that sort of thing.  
Elva wandered away again back into the garden; her Easter trip back to Denmark had been a difficult one. It had been a year since her brother had disappeared from their lives and out into Europe somewhere. Her mother had cried, her father had gone on several long walks across the beach, and her smallest sister had asked awkward questions.  
Suddenly, the guy hosting poked his head out of the kitchen door and called "Grub's up, chaps. Form an orderly queue in the living room please. And try not to spill anything."  
Elva slowly headed back inside, and came face to face with this Tom again as she took her place behind him in the queue for the table containing all the picky bits of food.  
"Plate?" He asked with a grin, holding out a plastic red plate.

"Tak," Elva replied in her native tongue, taking the plate from him with a smile.

He opened his mouth again and was momentarily stopped in saying anything by another rugby-type who wandered past and whacked him on the shoulders "Hey, Mike," he muttered before turning back to Elva and raising his eyebrows "That's the trouble with being somewhere like here. Too many people," he paused, turned away from her and then looked back and asked "So you're Danish aren't you?"

"Yes," Elva answered him with a wide grin "That was a good guess."

"Oh," he shrugged "You know, I like a good bit of Scandi-crime drame," he paused again and then asked, rather out of the blue "Which bit of Denmark are you from?"

"Copenhagen," Elva told him as she picked up a handful of little cocktail sausages "My boyfriend reckons all English-speaking people only know Copenhagen. Though technically I'm from just outside. But I grew up in Indonesia...my dad is a doctor."

"Interesting," the guy nodded as he piled his plate with little sausage rolls and bits of cheese "So you've got a boyfriend?"

Elva narrowed her eyes as she moved away from the table and found a little place to stand and eat; this Tom followed her and she answered "Mmm," she smiled "Bu..but he doesn't study over here. He's back in Denmark."

The night wore on and this Tom stuck by Elva for the entire evening, making the general small talk and asking the odd question.

The sun eventually went down and people began to disperse back out into the streets of Cambridge. Elva walked out into the hallway to find her cardigan and was again confronted by Tom.

"Hi," she smiled, her mind half in the hallway and half already back home in her little third-floor attic bedroom at the home she shared with five other students in Guest Road.   
"A...ha..have you got anybody to walk home with?" He asked.

"No," she shook her head "I came with a bottle of lemonade and that's gone so I'm all on my own."

He laughed, running a hand through his hair "Hehe," he looked up at her with bright eyes and quivering , thin lips "I...I could walk you home...I...I don't mind."

"No," Elva motioned to the door and shrugged "I...I think I'll be okay..it...it isn't far."

"I don't mind," Tom said, smiling slightly "I...I don't live that far from you"

Elva folded her arms across her chest after making sure her front door keys were in her handbag and exclaimed "You don't even know where I live." 

It was Tom's turn to shrug and he laughed "You never know," his expression was kind and he insisted "Please, it'll make me feel better. And your boyfriend will thank me."  
Elva let him walk her home, keeping her distance as they wandered out onto the Cambridge streets. 

It was fairly warm out, and Elva's companion finally decided to admit to her "I...I'm gonna say this," he looked at her and his eyes were twinkling "I...I recognised you from that telly show, what was it?" he clicked his fingers and looked up again to see Elva smiling over at him as they passed a tree on opposite sides.

"You watched Rejseholdet?" She asked and laughed "I somehow don't believe you."

"Really?" this Tom grinned "I have some odd hobbies and watching Scandinavian crime drama is one of them," he paused and added "I didn't understand much of it, mind you."

"Nobody ever understands Danish," Elva admitted before adding with a sheepish expression "Even some Danes."

"I went to Denmark once on a school trip," Tom reminisced as they crossed the road "Copenhagen was an incredible city."

"It's home to me," Elva sighed as she looked up at the stars "It'll always be incredible," she paused and decided to turn the conversation round onto this perfect stranger "So where are you from?"

"Me," he shrugged "Well, I was born in Oxford, I grew up in Oxford, I went to school in Oxford...and," he glanced up at Elva "And I ended up here. I'm not nearly as interesting as you are."

"I'm not interesting," Elva sighed "My dad is. I just happen to be his daughter."

Eventually the two reached the Victorian house where Elva lived with her friends made in the first year, the living room light was still on and her male housemates could be heard playing the PS2.

"Well," Elva motioned to the door "This is me."

"Yup," Tom sighed heavily and turned, offering his hand to her once again "It was nice meeting you."

"Likewise," Elva shook her hand "And thanks...fo..for dropping me back. Jesper, my boyfriend, I'll tell him that you looked after me."

Tom smiled and stepped back as Elva walked up the garden path towards the door "I'll see you around sometime then."

"Yeah," Elva smiled as she put the key in the door and opened it "Hopefully."

"Hopefully," she heard Tom mutter to himself as she shut the door behind her, noticing briefly as he waved and then started back down the road.


End file.
